Technical Field
The present invention generally relates to network transactions and, more particularly, to facilitating electronic commerce, including account verification, over a network.
Related Art
In electronic commerce, a user typically conducts financial transactions through electronic communication with online service providers over communication networks, such as the Internet. During the course of engaging in electronic commerce, the user provides identification information prior to requesting an online financial transaction. In general, conventional identification options include, for example, some form of payment media, such as a debit card number or a credit card number.
As such, in many instances, conventional identity verification techniques utilized by service providers require a user to provide a debit card number or credit card number to establish an online account and deposit funds to the online account from another account linked to the debit card or credit card. Unfortunately, since some users do not have a debit card or a credit card, these users often have difficulty depositing funds to the online account with the service provider.
Accordingly, these conventional identity verification techniques are insufficient and sometimes inconvenient for the user because the user is required to obtain either a debit card or a credit card, which may not be possible for the user. Hence, there exists a need to provide an improved verification technique to facilitate online financial transactions.